MUMBAI, India,
Oct 12 (IPS)- The hundreds of big dams built by India in the past half
century have boosted national food and industrial production, but at a
cost paid by the poorest, says a new study backed by both supporters and
critics of multi-purpose river schemes.
The survey was sponsored by the World Commission on Dams (WCD), which
has been set up by governments, aid agencies, non-governmental organisations
and anti-dam movements from across the world, to review the gains and
losses from the world's 45,000 large dams.

The India study
is one of several country studies, which are helping prepare the WCD global
report to be released in November. The India report, made available to
IPS, has advised India to build big dams only if the benefits can be spread
evenly among the people.

The WCD is
funded by industry, governments and aid agencies. It has held nine public
hearings on six continents and listened to experiences of 120 people from
68 countries, regarding 1,000 dams. Although the Indian government did
not permit a WCD hearing in the country two years ago, it subsequently
became a member of the global forum.

''Large dams...must
only be implemented if they also serve the cause of equitable distribution
of resources, wealth and opportunities,'' says the India country report
prepared by a team of Indian experts.

According to
the study, India's big dams have played an important role in increasing
farm productivity, power generation and industrial water supply. However,
they also had negative social and environmental effects, specially the
eviction of a sizeable part of India's population from its ancestral home.

India has more
than 4,000 large dams of over 15 metres height as defined by the International
Commission on Large Dams.

Nearly two-thirds
of the people displaced by multi-purpose river valley projects, are either
tribals or members of the socially oppressed 'scheduled castes', who have
the lowest incomes among the country's poor.

These groups
had to bear a disproportionate share of the social costs of big dams,
considering that tribals and scheduled castes make just one-fourth of
the Indian population, the report notes. The big dams have been specially
harsh on indigenous people, who are less than a tenth of India's population,
but made up nearly half of those displaced by the projects.

''There seems
no justification for the imposition of costs on millions of innocent tribals
and other rural people, who lose even the little they have in order to
benefit those who already have more than them,'' says the report.

The irrigation
benefits of big dams are reaped by farmers and others in the command areas
and the costs are borne by ''society at large, the taxpayers and the project
affected people,'' it adds.

The report
estimates that on average, each big dam in the country has submerged nearly
5,000 hectares of forest. In the last 20 years, big dams are estimated
to have swallowed up some 9.1 million hectares of India's forests.

The study notes
with concern that most of these schemes were not required to internalise
the costs of preventing or minimising their harmful impact. It expresses
greater worry over the Indian government's inability to enforce compliance
with project conditions.

Moreover, the
process of environmental impact assessment (EIA) of big dams was subjected
to political and administrative pressures, it says. ''Pressure is brought
upon the professional project consultants to prepare EIAs in a manner
such that the project is cleared,'' it says.

India is estimated
to have spent about 919 billion rupees (20 billion U.S. dollars) in the
past 50 years on irrigation schemes. Most of these were linked to dams.
However, India's big irrigation schemes have run up heavy financial losses,
with annual operational losses of more than 30 billion rupees (680 million
dollars) in 1993-94, the study estimates.

The report
also expresses worry that the safety aspect of big dams has been generally
neglected by planners. ''In dam after dam, it has been observed that the
required attention is not being paid to this very serious aspect of dam
appraisal,'' it points out.

Environmental
clearance for big dams was made compulsory by the government 22 years
ago, and ''that also more as a matter of policy than a statutory requirement.''
It became a statutory requirement only six years ago. More than 2,500
of the large Indian dams were begun before the year 1978.

''Consequently,
for these 2500 plus large dams, no assessment was required to be done
of their social and environmental costs or viability nor was there any
attempt to prevent or minimise most of the adverse impacts,'' says the
study. (END/IPS/ap-dv-en/mm/mu/00)

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